5 Digital Marketing Tips for Customer Service

10:49 PM

Many companies believe that simply monitoring their Facebook pages and Twitter feeds for customer...

Many companies believe that simply monitoring their Facebook pages and Twitter feeds for customer issues is sufficient to provide customer service. In this day and age where everything is about digital marketing,
the most forward thinking thing we can do is to look backwards. The
source of all contented customers comes from two major areas:

Personal service and attention

A quality product

In fact, a consumer is more likely to forgive a company for a
defective product over a shoddy or irritating service experience. For
example, one expects to buy a lousy product from a Canadian retail
company from time to time (i.e.: a cheap sound system that ceases to
work after a month.) But the measure of our satisfaction is related to
how well we are treated when we seek resolution.In the pre-digital marketing era, companies tended to take a more
human and personal approach when dealing with customer issues. This has
been replaced by the assumption that social media is doing it all. But
this isn’t the case. Granted, on Twitter, most complaints are simple and
numerous, so the best you can achieve is to produce stock answers.
While it’s great that companies are “listening” to their public, they
could learn a thing or two from the past.

ORM and Digital Marketing Initiatives

ORM, or Online Reputation Management is a $5 billion industry (according to this Forbes article.)
Companies are paying to ensure that fake online reviews (one example)
don’t harm the reputation of their business. What’s interesting is that
it will soon be considered an actionable offense to post lies in online reviews. The problem is, how soon can the lies be weeded out before harm is done to a company’s brand?How can we all improve our customer service and ensure that we
control our online reputation? Here are 5 tips to make you think about
how to treat your customers. Satisfaction will always come from your
personal attention. So consider how important customer satisfaction
really is.

1. Display Your Success in Customer Support

Do you have an online (or offline) method for getting customer
comments? By placing positive reviews and messages from contented
customers on your website, you improve your credibility along with your
digital marketing message. While the same is true when it comes to
describing the awards you’ve received, remember that hearing the words
of actual customers is far more effective a way for others to believe in
the quality of your service and product.

2. Be Clear and Present

Wouldn’t it be great if you could hover over the shoulder of your
clients to make sure they’re using your product or service properly? It
would be great if you could answer any question quickly and efficiently.
This is exactly what the people at Amazon have done with their new
Mayday system. They take customer support to the next level by
integrating a live-chat employee into their machines. With a simple
click of a button, they can talk directly with a representative to get
the answers they need. Live screen sharing and even live screen
highlighting make fixing any problem a breeze. Think about that the next
time you’re trying to create a PDF out of multiple files in Mac’s
Preview app.

The point is: to be clear and present with your support. The online service of Firefly
has a co-browsing feature that allows your representatives the ability
to screen share an open browser of your clients. Much like Mayday, you
can provide live, real time support. This can help your customers to
better navigate your website, which in turn leads to happy customers.

3. Some People Respond Better to Video

I have friends who call me up all the time to ask how to create a PDF
in Mac’s Preview. While I enjoy the one-on-one time, for the most part
my first response is always: Isn’t this a question for Google? I learn
everything I need from helpful online tutorials. But I also realize that
not everyone learns best by reading text on a screen. My friend’s
response is always the same: “I just need someone to show and tell me
the answer.”With this in mind, why not consider improving and increasing the
video content on your website? If you have a common complaint or
question, make a video tutorial. This can be in the form of actual
employees in front of a camera, or by using screen capture software (I
use Screenflow
for Mac.) I suggest you provide both a text and a video method at the
same time. Because some of us still enjoy reading rather than watching
(and of course) Google doesn’t know how to optimize for sound just yet.

4. Publish Reports on Customer Service Wins

Every few months or so, why not compile a list of the best customer
reviews / comments and create a newsletter or report? Share with your
public the success you’ve had in the last quarter with these stories? If
you’ve received some negative comments, you can address them here as
well. Show how the event occurred and what steps were taken to address
the customer’s concerns. This is absolute transparency and not every
company is up for it. However, the more you disclose, the more likely
your brand story will be repeated, retweeted and shared across social
media.

5. Get as Personal as Possible

Some companies have gone so far as to send out hand-written thank-you
notes to their customers. Digital marketing companies such as MailLift.com
can reproduce this service on your behalf. This may be a bit extreme,
and not really fit with the brand of your company. Not everyone values a
handwritten note in the same way.

It is a good idea, however, to get your corporate-level employees
involved. The mayor of Toronto claimed to be available any time to take phone calls
from the citizens. Whether he managed to do this or not, isn’t as
important as that he appeared to want to. Get your CEOs involved in both
customer support as well as social media channels. Customers will
always value a person and personality behind a brand more than simply a
brand persona.

Conclusion

You can take control of your online reputation. By keeping positive
reviews on top and addressing the negative ones, you will show that you
are engaged and concerned. Ignoring problems won’t help and ignoring
compliments won’t benefit you.

In further conclusion, I honestly don’t really know how to make a PDF
using Preview, so if someone could send me a link to an online
tutorial, I’d be grateful. “Isn’t this a question for Google?” You might
be asking. Yes, but then I would be robbed of the opportunity to engage
with my readers and thereby increase our customer satisfaction.